Cost per tooth is up 42 percent from $2.60 average in 2011

The Tooth Fairy better hit up the nearest ATM the next time duty calls.

The average tooth is fetching $4 these days, according to a new surveyby payment processor Visa Inc., released Friday.

That's a 42 percent jump from the $2.60 average reported in 2011, and one heck of a lot more than most people remember finding under their pillows growing up.

How much kids get depends on where they live, according to the survey.

Kids in the Northeast rake in the most cash at $4.10 per tooth. In the West and South, kids receive $3.70 and $3.60 per tooth, while Midwestern kids receive the least, at $3.30 a tooth, The Associated Press reported.

Why is the cost going up so much? Competition -- not only among kids but parents, too, experts say.

"A kid who got a quarter would wonder why their tooth was worth less than the kid who got $5," Kit Yarrow, a consumer psychologist and professor at Golden Gate University, told the AP.

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